Support for Democratic contender Clark brings almost a thousand hateful e-mails
By DOUG SAUNDERS
Tuesday, December 23, 2003 - Page A18
... Few Republican Party loyalists in the United States noticed that a young Edmonton man set up a website called Canadians for Wesley Clark, urging Canadians to support the popular retired general's bid to become the Democratic Party's presidential candidate.
Mr. Clark's official website links to the page.
Within hours, news of the Edmonton site was picked up by gossip gadfly Matt Drudge and became a top news story on the Texas-based website GOPUSA, a one-man operation whose news stories often provide content for hundreds of phone-in radio shows across the United States.
Less than 12 hours later, the Canadian made headlines in the conservative New York Sun, which proclaimed: "Anti-Bush Foreigners Eye Web for Donations to Democrats."
By the end of the day on Friday, the Edmonton website had become part of the election: George W. Bush's campaign team sent millions of Republicans a fundraising letter that accuses Mr. Clark of "raising foreign cash to attack our president."...
... "There's no question that conservatives have built up a sophisticated echo chamber in which talk radio and cable help drive certain stories" that have their origins on the Internet, said Howard Kurtz, a Washington-based media analyst for CNN, as well as The Washington Post.
"One could argue that the so-called liberal media do the same thing, but the right, which sees itself as shut out of the mainstream media, has become awfully skilled at taking what might seem like a minor matter and blowing it up into the issue of the day," Mr. Kurtz said.
Left-wing and centrist websites and magazines are nowhere near as co-ordinated and organized as those of their Republican counterparts.
"What we do here is, we cater to a conservative audience. ...
... "One reason this conservative message delivery system will probably play a role in the 2004 campaign is that news and opinion travel so much more quickly in the Internet age," Mr. Kurtz said, "and what used to become a story in a few days now happens in a few hours."
Link to entire story:
http://www.globetechnology.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/